JAM SESSION: Relocating Fire Department headquarters

Saturday

What do you think of the idea of relocating Fire Department headquarters to town owned property on Long Pond Road?

Jam session is an opinion forum offering comments on issues from a group of Plymouth residents. It appears on the Forum pages in the Weekend edition of the OCM.

The newspaper poses a question to the group each week, and participants choose whether to comment. This column is designed to bring the voices of well-informed residents into the Forum page to address issues, one at a time.

Participants cross the local political spectrum and live throughout the town. Some are current or past Town Meeting representatives, and all are active in the community. We hope their diverse points of view will encourage discussion of the issues Plymouth faces.

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Plymouth administration is considering pursuing relocated Fire Department headquarters to town owned property on Long Pond Road, saying the current facility needs millions of dollars in repairs. What do you think of the idea?

Pat Adelmann

I'll wait for judgement on the possibility of a fire station and headquarters at 91 Long Pond Road until the preliminary budget is prepared by the architect and owner's project manager. The proposed location is better centered geographically and closer to expanding development but would it offer the older part of town safe response times? At this point, the benefits of a new station outweigh the repair costs for the existing fire station.

Pat Adelmann has been a Plymouth resident since 1977and is a mother of five Plymouth Public School graduates, a proud grandmother of 12, a former School Committee member and a former Town Meeting representative.

Jay Beauregard

No. Perform maintenance on what we already own. The town has acknowledged that we have a financial situation brewing that is a major concern. We don’t even know yet how the sewer fiasco is going to be paid for. As we are fully aware of our financial state, we should avoid taking on any more debt. Period. This can has been kicked down the road for many decades. And it should come to stop now and dealt with. Deal with our finances now. Don’t pass it on to our children. There have been many times that I have been told that “I can’t afford to live here.” The question last week was about affordable housing. How about putting the brakes on taxes so it is a little bit more affordable?

Jay Beauregard, born and raised in Plymouth, served four years in the Marine Corps and has worked for 38 years at a local company. He is a Libertarian who served three terms as a Town Meeting rep from Precinct 6.

Jeff Berger

I totally agree with Chief Bradley and Town Manager Arrighi, It's a smart and very timely solution.

A Plymouth resident for more than 40 years, Jeff Berger is founder and owner of JMB Communications / websitesthatworkusa.com and everythingsxm.com as well as Northeast Ambassador for SkyMed International, www.getskymed.com. He is a former chairman of Plymouth’s Nuclear Matters Committee and its Cable Advisory Committee.

Karen Buechs

Infrastructure! Infrastructure! Cost? Long Pond Road is already over burdened with excessive traffic. Multiply the traffic we have now, potential traffic due to the new 24-hour diesel gas station and a whopping 330 40b housing project that is coming online in the near future. Two schools are in close proximity as is the hospital. Buses transport children at crucial times during the day. Throw in the every day traffic as we shop at our favorite stores. A doctor's building and a prison are also located in the area. That corridor is a thoroughfare to residential homes further down the road.

Now to the cost … Is this one of the reasons why the Town Manager hinted there may be an override needed? Not on my watch. Everyone knows I'm a huge supporter of our fire personnel. I've always voted for safety issues by giving them all the equipment and resources they need. Town Meeting recently voted for a new Fire Station in North Plymouth. For many years Town Meeting asked officials to take care of buildings we already have. We just hired a maintenance facilitator to do just that. It seems for one building it's too little too late. At this time I cannot support this initiative. Taxpayers are screaming for relief. It is time to reign in the spending. Reign in the spending! Please!

Karen Buechs is a Town Meeting representative and serves as Chair of Precinct 7. She sat on the Manomet Steering Committee, Manomet Village Common Inc., Capital Outlay Committee and the Revenue Idea Task Force. She also served as Charter Commission member and on three Charter Review Committees. Along with her husband Ken, Karen has been a resident of Plymouth for 46 years.

Rick Caproni

The fire department has become a bottomless pit continually grasping for money from the taxpayers of Plymouth. Start with a new $11 million North Plymouth station. Why not a $6 or $7 million building? Did anybody at Town(clown) Meeting even ask the question? Next the addition of nine new firefighters which will cost millions upon millions of taxpayer dollars over the next several years. Justification was reducing response time from 18 to 16 minutes. Wasteful spending with no meaningful debate or discussion. Response time statistic arbitrary at best. I would be willing to wait the extra two minutes. Add a new $675,000 piece of equipment which was defeated at town meeting but later reversed on an illegal second vote. A new fire station should not even be considered until existing departmental costs (e.g $700,000/yr in overtime) are brought under control. Years of neglect by department management as well as BOS not a justification. Time for some resignations and reorganization but doubtful it would ever happen.

Rick Caproni is a Town Meeting representative from Precinct 15, a retired equipment leasing executive and a self described political activist.

Birgitta Kuehn

Establishing a Main Firehouse and the department’s administrative offices in a new location with new facilities is correctly being explored. It’s a business decision that will take into consideration the balance of long term expense, no matter new or current location, with the safety of a growing town and a forecasted future. The town manager would be remiss if these calculations were missing from our discussions. Deferred maintenance, millions to fix a leaking roof and walls. For some reason the well worn, but prescient story of the finger in the dike comes to mind.

Birgitta Kuehn is a recently retired clinician and healthcare executive. She serves as chairwoman of the Board of Health and alternate to the Planning Board. Her commitment to volunteering spans local conservation and environmental groups, PACTV “The Plymouth Show” and the League of Women Voters.

Mike Landers

I anticipated this during presentations at Town Meeting. It’s a shame that our building maintenance has been so abysmal in so many of our town owned properties. It’s a positive move to now have townwide assessment by the new head of building maintenance, but with repairs at this level coming up in many of the reports, there very well could be many more requests like this from different departments. Our day-to-day maintenance on current properties needs to be stepped up to slow the deterioration of very expensive buildings. With one new fire station soon under construction, I think that another new station on the heels of the Hedge Road station, needs to be looked at from outside the box so that the costs are not passed on to the taxpayer. The current Town Hall was built at no cost to the taxpayers, the Plymouth Airport Administration Building is being constructed at a fraction of the price, due to brilliant grant writing and the town portion from receipts brought in from the existing enterprise fund. So again, no cost to the taxpayer. Perhaps another look at bringing town ambulance needs under the roof of the Fire Department would bring the enormous revenue that Brewster and any other contractors receive, back into the town coffers. Towns that have done so have realized enormous benefit. Finally, what are the values for resale of properties that have these sorts of problems?

Mike Landers is a Town Meeting representative and is the founder and producer of Project Arts of Plymouth. He is also the owner of Nightlife Music Company and is a performing musician.

David Peck

More details, please. We heard at Town Meeting that the building is leaking (five out of seven fire stations have this problem!) so we understood that investigation was needed on fixes. The Building Committee had been briefed that professionals were studying the central Fire Station and that a report would be forthcoming. How the issue moved from targeted renovations to complete replacement is something we need to learn more about. I would not be surprised to learn that the functionality of the building no longer meets current Fire Department standards, not just the construction. Besides housing the trucks and equipment, decontamination facilities are required. Other specialized programmatic equipment storage and separate male and female sleeping and locker facilities for firefighters may be required. Keeping the station open and functional during major renovations could mean costly phasing. It may therefore be cheaper to build new, on property the Town owns, rather than a major renovation and rehab. But the Town needs to show us that all options have been studied and estimated in order to get to this recommendation.

David Peck is the retired director of Facility Planning at Boston Children's Hospital. He serves as the chairman of the Plymouth Building Committee and vice-chairman of the Zoning Board of Appeals. He is a Town Meeting representative from Precinct 4.

Roger Silva

Probably a good idea since I proposed selling the property 25 years ago as did Butch Machado after me. Could of earned the town enormous tax returns over the years! The should have to sell Central before building a new one. Bet they won’t!!

Roger Silva is a former five-term Plymouth selectman who began public service as an elected Town Meeting member. He has served on the Advisory and Finance Committee and two charter commissions.